NY auto dealers trying to shut down Tesla Motors in NY

Compared to what, exactly?

> Further, the diffing format used there is atrocious.

That's a really common problem.

> Law is code. Why haven't we fixed this yet?

Mostly, because there is no first party money in it, and there's considerable expense to do it as a third-party solution, because of exactly the problem that this is directed at solving.

There's quite a bit of money in third-party solutions, which are provided by several vendors to the people who have the money and motivation to pay for them (people who professionally deal with the law), as components of wider research suites that cover more than just statute law (including many copyright-protected sources).

Third-party solutions that use only the free-of-copyright public information don't have a lot of market, and would have a lot of expense to create and maintain (not the system, so much as keeping the data current.)

Auto dealers are basically the guys trying to screw you over on the price of a new car. In other words, NOT Ford, or Toyota, or Volvo. But the guys selling the cars.

This is equivalent to, for example, mistaking the guy who runs a BP gas station with BP the company. Boycotting the gas station does jack shit to the bottom line of BP, though it does make for nasty public relations.

On top of that, he does so with no evidence that 'auto dealers' are even behind this bill being pushed through. Maybe it is the auto makers and not the dealers. Maybe it's a different source entirely, like the oil industry. Who the fuck knows?

And that's my point - this is an ambiguous incendiary tweet alleging something we don't know and can't prove. The only thing that's a real fact is there's a bill in New York and Elon Musk wants you to get mad about it.

For RM, the 'broken' differencing format was a feature, not a bug. It allowed him to slip though all kinds of law changes without people understanding what he was up to. The book has many, many examples of exactly this differencing format being put to use to gain power.

The point about the differencing format is more broadly true - prior to reading the book, I thought politics was about having the right ideas, and explaining them clearly. But the book compellingly argues that politics is really about obtaining and wielding power. The people who thrive in politics are more interested in power than ideas.

It is a book that is well worth reading, especially if you are an idealistic programmer (like I was) who cannot understand why we can't just 'clean politics up.' (Also, Caro's LBJ biography is awesome, with similar themes.)